On Monday, Canepa will lead a committee meeting with an especially big item on the agenda - a hearing on Stockton's 2012 Comprehensive Annual Financial Report.

Through hundreds of pages, the report spells out how the city spent its money during that year and gives an assessment of Stockton's fiscal health. The assessment was prepared by the outside auditing firm of Pun & McGeady LLP.

It details the $1.2 billion in assets Stockton had in 2012, a year marked by the challenges of confidential talks with Wall Street creditors and with unions, followed by Stockton's bankruptcy filing.

The financial report is one year overdue. That fact has come up often in challenges to Stockton's bankruptcy from critics arguing that they had no way of knowing the true state of the city's finances.

Canepa, who has yet to finish studying the report, said he's not yet an "audit geek," but he also never expected to be as excited as he was Wednesday when he received the report.

"You have to really embrace it to understand it," said Canepa, who is joined on the Audit Committee by Councilmen Michael Tubbs and Elbert Holman.

For his part, Leiba credits Canepa for at least hearing him out. Most people don't consider financial reports to be as exciting as Stockton politics, but Leiba added that they are more important.

"He washes cars for a living," Leiba said. "But he always answers the phone when I call. ... Paul's due some acknowledgment."

Leiba also praised Canepa for holding monthly audit meetings, something that wasn't done before. In Leiba's ideal world, everybody would know how to read a budget and City Hall would produce financial statements more than yearly.

He knows that's a fantasy, but Leiba keeps pushing for transparency and answers.

"Most of the problems would be avoided if you had monthly financial reports and you had an Audit Committee that was educated and read them," Leiba said. "That's what needs to be done."

Without an institutional shift focusing Stockton on its finances, the city once again could find itself in a serious financial pinch, Leiba said.

The report on Monday's agenda shows some improvement, he said, but that's not saying a lot about a broke city. He compared Stockton's finances to the Titanic.

"It stopped taking on water," he said. "But you can't get any lower."

Contact reporter Scott Smith at (209) 546-8296 or ssmith@recordnet.com. Follow his blog at recordnet.com/smithblog and on Twitter @ssmithatrecord.